Two Good Conversations - Dan & Doug

Yesterday Dan Schmick and I sat down to chat about our community, as opposed to the "this district versus that city" stuff. Dan has served as the finance director at the Metro District for the past several years. With Jim Worley coming on board as the new manager of the District, an opportunity arose for Dan to move to the City to serve as finance director there. Districts are a bit different from cities, so this new role will give Dan exposure to additional topics in his profession. Jim is well experienced in District management. Welcome to Dan and Jim in their new roles!

Dan and I have always gotten along very well, and I think he's very good at what he does. It was my suggestion to the Council that they engage him to provide services to the City rather than the firm that is currently engaged in that pursuit. I'm happy to see Dan come on board at the City. I do believe the current firm has done a good job in improving our financial reporting, as well as this year's budget process. It just makes sense to me that Dan could handle the financial tasks at both the City and the District, saving each entity - and the citizens of the community - money. (Both entities would need to hire separate auditors to review the books Dan would keep for the separate entities.) This is the sort of combination of efforts that makes good sense and saves citizens money now, as opposed to grandiose visions bandied about these past several years.

I want to thank Councilman Doug Gilbert for chatting with me substantively about City issues last Saturday. We were both attending the same social function, and after a few minutes we migrated the conversation to topics of the City. We had a good back and forth discussion. It's been too long since we did that. I look forward to more of same. Thanks again to Doug.

I'll share with you the thoughts I expressed to them. The City needs a study to determine the life cycle costs of maintaining our roads. If we have plenty of revenue, that's great news! If we need to ask for a tax increase to pay for this obligation, let's pull together the data, and then make the case to residents for a 2012 TABOR ballot question to pay for the City's obligations. It's my sense we will need a robust capital plan to fund this obligation. Does it hurt to find out?